Meet Doug Lewis, Our Awesome Intern

posted by gloria ohland | 494mp
October 13, 2016

As a part of Move LA for the next few months, my mission will be spread awareness of Los Angeles’ public transportation happenings to Angelenos. I hope to motivate residents, travelers, and tourists alike to see Los Angeles from outside the automobile — and to see the city from a lens closer to its people, architecture, and history.

Growing up on the East Coast, I never quite considered that public transportation would be an option to traverse this city. Before actually experiencing Los Angeles I pictured a city aligned with its popular tropes: A mass of freeways and urban sprawl riddled with unwieldy traffic jams. Like Reyner Banham in his famous self-defined "Autopia" of Los Angeles: The Architecture of Four Ecologies, I figured the only way to understand the city, like a true Angeleno, was through driving. Los Angeles was a far cry from the East Coast cities I arrived from, where public transportation was often regarded as primary rather then a brief afterthought.

Yet as a car-less (not careless!) college student I had no choice but to travel Los Angeles by an amalgamation of public transportation options, an experience that has opened my eyes to powerful role transportation plays in creating livable, communal, sustainable cities. Transportation is the lifeblood of a city, connecting people from all walks of life and purposes in everyday life in a single space. In the next few months I intend to show the tangible and intangible benefits public transportation can provide to Los Angeles residents — stay tuned for more.